The Endings (AD Fighter)
Gigabane's Ending After meeting countless challenges and slowly accumulating the power of Animadversionite as his prize, the masked spy GIGABANE has reached the Temple of Hiskor at last. Broken and defeated at the spy's feet, the ANIMATOR OF CHAOS begins to plea. "You wish to take my power for your organization," he whispers. "But my power will last only as long as I do. And if you are to allow me to slink away, why not strike a deal?" "I'll have none of your bargains," Gigabane replies, loading the last of the green crystals into a suitcase as he did. "I fight for the WPN, and we do not share power. I'm taking the Animadversionite and sealing you back where you came from." With that, the spy stepped out of the temple's inner sanctum and began to push the great stone doors closed, a gesture he had learned would seal the Animator in the underworld once more. "Very well then," boomed the Animator's voice, "but you should know that I will not travel alone!" Second before the doors swing shut, an ethereal tentacle launches out and impales the triumphant spy... ... As the Temple of Hiskor sinks beneath the sands once more, a dark, scarred man in a suit watches on - it is CAPTAIN AWESOME, fearless leader of the WPN Spy Network. His lips curve into a rare smile as his trusted servant Gigabane climbs slowly from the temple's mouth, just in time... and carrying the Animadversionite. "You have served your cause beyond all reckoning," the Captain shouts to his lieutenant in a voice filled with pride. "The WPN Network can never thank you enough... no price is too great. Just name your payment, and it shall be yours." A strangely hollow laugh comes from beneath the spy's silver helmet. Gigabane clutches his helmet from behind and pulls it over his head.. to reveal a skull, bare of flesh or skin, sitting naked upon his shoulders. It turns to face the shocked Captain with black, souless eye sockets. "Hell," whispers Gigabane. "There is... hell to pay..." Half-beard’s Ending At long last, the intrepid mercenary HALF-BEARD toppled all obstacles in his way and found himself in the inner sanctum of the Hiskor Temple once more. Though his companions EDGE and BLADE have collapsed in battle, Half-beard remains standing before the defeated ANIMATOR OF CHAOS. He raises his cutlass in the air and prepares to land the final blow. “Stay your hand, pirate,” the god’s voice echoes throughout the chamber. “You are a mercenary, yes? You fight for wealth and renown… but killing me now will leave you poor and anonymous!” Ethereal images flood the room of an older Half-beard decorated in medals, surrounded by treasure, and at the head of a vast army. “Let me live, and you can keep the powers you have gained from the Animadversionite,” the Animator continues. “Or better yet, make a deal with me, and anything you desire can be yours!” “The only thing I want is to change the world back to the way it was before your kind got released,” Half-beard growls. “I want to go back to living in a world without you!” But before he can strike, another warrior leaps forth from the shadows. It is Edge, injured and unarmed, now standing between Half-beard and his quarry with arms spread. “I can’t let you rob me of this power, Half-beard… if you want to destroy the Animator,” Edge says with a smirk, “you’ll have to kill me first!” “Open your eyes, you idiot,” Half-beard cries. “If we let this thing survive, it’ll only come back to kill us eventually! We have to end this here!” “Then do it… cut me down and finish this battle,” Edge replies, still grinning. “Unless, of course, you can’t bear to sully your hands with a friend’s blood yet again…” The two warriors stare at one another for a moment. Half-beard’s grip on his cutlass seems to weaken… but finally he lifts it high and thrusts it deep into his fellow mercenary’s chest. “It’s not on my hands,” the pirate whispers, “old friend.” So it was that Half-beard found the strength to topple every obstacle in his way and destroy the curse of Hiskor, once and for all. AlexTrebek’s Ending Through a combination of wacky antics and sheer hi-jinx, the kung-fu cyborg DJ ALEXTREBEK managed to overcome numerous less-ridiculous opponents and reach the Temple of Hiskor, where he used his cybernetic bond with the Animadversionite to defeat its progenitor, the ANIMATOR OF CHAOS. “Alright, Animation-Face,” announces Trebek, “it’s time someone taught you some manners by killing you I guess! HIYA!” “Wait, no!” the Animator hisses. “Think about it… the only reason you survived the accident was your fusion with the Animadversionite. If I die, the Animadversionite loses its power, and you’ll die as well!” Trebek thought his over for a moment, then produced a tape recorder from inside the palm of his mechanical hand. “NOTE TO SELF: MY FORCE OF LIFE IS TIED TO EVIL ANIMATION-FACE SO AS TO MAKE MY FACE BE OF SADNESS?” he remarked. “That being said, perhaps we can make some kind of deal…?” the Animator proposes. “Ooh! Can you get me tickets to a live taping of Jeopardy?” Trebek squeals. “I… yes,” the dark god replies disbelievingly. “Yes, that can be arranged.” “What, so you assume I like Jeopardy just because my name is Alex Trebek?!” the cyborg cries angrily. With that, he somersaults outside of the chamber and prepares to close the doors behind him. “Time to seal away your loquacious bodaciousness once and for all perhaps, Animation-Face!” he announces. Before Alex can push the door shut, however, a strange sense of clarity dawns upon him He remembers his true identity of Maxwell Edison, the world’s leading paranormal scientist… he finds the metallic portions of his body shifting back into human flesh… and notices that a tentacle has emerged from within the chamber, wrapping itself around his leg. “Perhaps your true self will be easier to reason with… you see that it is but a trifle for me to restore your mind and body to what it once was,” the god’s voice continues. “I can make you a man again… I can make you anything you want to be… if you but pledge servitude to me!” Maxwell shakes his head and kicks off the tentacle, returning him to his previous state. “Sorry, dude,” he shouts, “but some people like being crazy.” And with that, he slammed the doors shut. Edge’s Ending Finally, the power-hungry bounty hunter EDGE has reached the inner sanctum of the Hiskor Temple and defeated its master. Though his companions HALF-BEARD and BLADE have collapsed in battle, Edge remains standing before the defeated ANIMATOR OF CHAOS, bathed in the green glow of the Animadversionite heaped before him. “So the one who released me from my prison has come to meet me at last,” the Animator remarks in a fearless voice. “And you’ve defeated that worthless host MATT WILSON for me as well… yes, how perfect. It is time for your destiny to be fulfilled.” “Don’t listen to him, Edge!” Half-beard shouts, rising weakly to his feet. “He’s trying to enslave you like he did Wilson!” “Your voice… is the one I’ve been hearing in my head all this time, isn’t it?” Edge asks softly. “Indeed,” the god replies, “for I have been watching you with great interest. You radiate with all the qualities necessary to be this world’s new king… hatred and power chief among them. Unite with me, and you will be unstoppable!” “You’re not the first to receive this offer, Edge,” Blade announces, still struggling to lift himself from where his host body lie broken on the ground. “It will seem like you’re in control at first, an invincible king destined to conquer the world… but in time you’ll exert less and less control over your own body. You’ll become an empty, vapid puppet. And even if you are released from the Animator’s power, you will exist as but a shell of a man, able only to haunt the lands you once sought to rule…” Edge is only half-conscious of Blade’s ravings. Dark tentacles launch forth from the Animator’s body and into Edge’s, and the god slowly pulls himself inside of the mercenary. Edge does not fight, laughing maniacally instead as he feels the god’s power inhabit every fiber of his being. Finally only he remains, luminescent with green energy and drifting effortlessly through the air. “My destiny… is at hand!” he laughs. With a mighty roar, Half-beard uses the last of his strength to charge towards Edge, his cutlasses raised. Edge raises an arm to defend himself… and to his own surprise, a massive wave of green energy careens through the air. It collides with the pirate, sending his flesh flying from his bones in miniscule blackened particles. A charred skeleton falls to the ground. Blade follows suit, leaping from behind the Animator’s new host to catch him off guard… but Edge needs only to glare at his assailant, and his body bursts apart as though a warhead has detonated inside of his ribcage. He has killed both of his friends in a span of only seconds, and he hasn’t even been trying… “Yes!” rings a familiar voice within Edge’s skull. “See what tremendous powers we now command?! We are unprecedented, undefeatable! Our reign will never… what are you doing?” Edge had floated over to Blade’s – Serling’s? – scattered remains. The great crimson sword still remains. He effortlessly lifts it from the ground and, struggling against an alien force pulling upon his muscles, places its sharp edge against his chest. His friends had been right… and he could not allow this terrible power to exist any longer… … The Temple of Hiskor crumbled into dust, each brick slipping back into the desert crevice from which it came. Nothing would ever emerge from that place again. Blade’s Ending The Animator, its ethereal carapace fractured and its stamina drained, fell thrashing back into its crystal prison. The righteous mercenaries have been lead to victory by the oldest champion of their cause, the dark god’s first opponent – the one known only as the BLADE. “Now to finish things,” Blade says, lowering his enormous spirit-housing sword to the ground. “What is done next will lower this place back beneath the ground, where the sands will return to swallow it. It is safest that you all leave now.” HALF-BEARD’s triumphant smile wavers. “But you’re staying here?” he asks. “What about Serling?” Blade nods. “Of course, he will be released,” he said. “I have strength enough to do this alone.” The possessed warrior tosses his weapon into the air, and a red ghost, transparent and featureless, appears in its trajectory to catch it. It is the ghost from within the sword. Serling falls at once to his knees, rubbing his head and glancing around in confusion as he does. “Ugh… what happened?” he groggily asks, tearing away the red scarf obscuring his mouth. “Why am I wearing this stuff? Are we still in that underground temple?” “We were just about to leave,” Half-beard says with a smirk. “Listen, ghost… thanks for all the-“ “Your gratitude is unnecessary,” the specter says in a cold voice that caused Serling to leap back to his feet. “I have only done what I was wrought to do. Now go, quickly… and remember what lessons you have learned in this place.” Half-beard nods, as does EDGE (though a light in his eyes showed that he was still fighting an urge to make a dash for the Animadversionite). Dragging a baffled Serling behind them, they flee the temple. The Animator’s voice fills the chamber again. “So it comes to this once more,” it says. “I suppose you shall let me live this day, as you have at the close of every other age?” “It is as I told the mortals,” Blade says as he makes his way over to the chamber’s gates. “I do only what I am wrought to do, and that is to aid in each struggle against the Animator of Chaos and his agents. It is not mine to end you. You and your powers must remain to daunt and tempt mankind, until they can prove themselves to be beyond your snare once and for all.” The ghost slams the gates shut. The glow of the crystals wanes as the Animator’s spirit dissipates from the place, and in the closing darkness the sword lies itself to rest, wedging itself in the chamber’s floor. “Only then can I truly rest,” the Blade whispers. “Until then… I wait.” Mysnsucks' Ending In the marble throne room of the Chienconaros dynasty sits the violet-robed King Alexander Rex, who had been known mere months before under the alias of MYSNSUCKS as an opportunist and a marauder in that fateful tournament. With the brush as a standard of his wisdom, and with the indomitable spirit of a man denied his birthright, he vanquished all who contested his claim of the green power. Claim it he did, and in the bowels of Hiskor he did battle with its master… before coming to an agreement. His throne room is populated with gifts: some gold and gemstone, others relics of history, still others symbolic odes to his majesty and power. All are tokens of defeat, reminders of how the villains who murdered his father has fallen and knelt and wept at his feet for mercy. None could stand against him, for he was righteous, and the power was his. He had not led the demon armies against his foes. Those had been dissolved, in both senses of that word. He did not even consent to host the Animator. His reign was to be one of reason, after all, not haunted by tales of sorcery and ghouls. But simply having that power with him, stowed away in his brush and scepter, caused armies to amass in his name almost by their own accord, and drove them to win each battle. Every last battle. He has been half-listening to a messenger. The boy is excitedly reporting the progress made on some distant front in the latest war. Of course, the war had never really stopped. It could not be stopped. The borders of King Alex’s kingdom must be made to expand. He could not cease his campaign until the world had been delivered into his hands… only, not his hands. Not really. The messenger is dismissed from the throne room, and the King’s scepter, confident that it is alone, begins to cast a dim green glow, coloring the marble around it. Seeing this color, King Alexander knows that he is a slave. Bioten's Ending The world has suffered six painful years since the ending of the AD Fighters tournament, since the extermination of all opposition by the demonic armies and their dark allies. The damned warrior BIOTEN sees now for the first time what changes have come to pass in that interval as he steps outside the threshold of the Hiskor temple. The sky is red as blood now, the ground rife with scars. That which was once a desert is now prickling with great deformed masses of glass, no doubt baked by the storms of hellfire which now sweep the globe. He did not need to travel far before finding his master, still in the body of the irate man which Bioten himself had delivered unto him. He turned from the demon who he had been speaking with to face the new arrival. “You,” he hisses. “Yes, I,” Bioten says, half-bowing as he did. “I, the Bioten who was once called James Hunter, who led his master’s forces to victory some time ago.” “I remember,” the Animator says. “And once the greater part of the work was done, I relieved your kind of their duties, dead man. Demons alone are now my servants, and you belong in your own domain.” “Yes, I have been making the most of my vacation in hell, to be sure,” the being with the blazing skull replies. “Master, do you recall how I rose from the ranks of hell to serve you?” The Animator rolls his eyes. “You subsisted on what you had gleaned from a shard of my power, and used it to sculpt your suit from the agony of souls. You have related this tale to me before, and I have ceased to be amused at your pride in this insignificant feat. Why do you related this to me now, in my domain?” Embers flicker excitedly in Bioten’s eye sockets. “I thought you’d like to know,” he whispers. “I’ve been teaching.” He claps his hands once, and a small army emerges from the temple behind him. They are mirror images of Bioten, to a point – they wear the same type of suit, and their skulls are also wreathed in orange flame. Their shapes, though, are different… and yet, at the same time, strangely familiar. “What game is this?” the Animator cries. “Who are these dead ones, and why are they arrayed thusly?” “These are the fighters felled in the tournament that erupted in this land six years ago,” Bioten says, floated proudly into the air. “Each was slain, many by my hand…. and all were connected in some way to your power. I hunted them down in the afterlife, rescuing them from oblivion as I did myself. There is one difference between them and me, however… unlike me, they are truly loyal to their master.” The Animator howls with rage, and begins forming spheres of chaotic energy in his palms. “You dare betray me, Bioten?” he shouts. ‘You dare lead an army against your god?” Before the Animator can hurl his weapons, a volley of flaming daggers are launched from every direction by Bioten’s army, which quickly surrounds him. He tries to repel the assaults with his own more powerful attacks, but he is quickly overwhelmed by their combined strength. His host body falls to the earth, succumbing to the incinerating flames of hell. “The time of gods and demons is over,” Bioten cackles. “The dead shall inherit the earth!” Zack's Ending The Ninjitsu Order of Kocak was formed during a time of war and devastation to prepare future generations for the next coming of the Animator of Chaos. They were taught how to oppose his machinations, and if he managed to rise again, how to destroy him once and for all. Over half a millennium later, when the teachings of the Kocak Order had been lost to time save two remaining adherents, the most unlikely of ninjas – ZACK, warrior of the feline spirit and trusty sidekick of REI – managed to fulfill the Order’s objectives once and for all. It all happened so fast, Rei thinks, as she sits there, alone, in the desert. She and Zack had dispatched the Animator’s host body with their combined strength. After a lengthy, intense battle, the all-powerful Animator himself had been beaten off by an impassioned display of martial arts from none other than Zack. The short, green-haired ninja had taken his enchanted katana and thrusted it deep within the well of crystals from which the god stored and drew his power… and then, all hell had broken loose. It began with a terrible scream, the horrible wail of a dying god. But soon, the noise was overcome by the rumbling of that ancient place tearing itself apart, preparing to sink down into the vast chasm below. Rei quickly leapt from where she had been standing, barely dodging huge blocks of sandstone as they rained down upon the sagging floor. She rushed to the entrance, only turning to make sure Zack was behind her after reaching the outdoors… but she could see nothing but sand as a mystical explosion from somewhere within the chamber sent her flying in a sea of rubble. And so Rei sits there, alone, on the edge of what was now a brick-strewn hole in the desert, her face in her hands and her head in the past. She stands. “ZAAACK!” she cries to the heavens. “WHERE ARE YOU?!” A muffled voice calls her name from but a stone’s throw away. Her eyes widen, and she rushes to the source, finding a tuft of green hair sticking out of the sand. She thrusts her hands into the ground, pulls up, and plucks her trusty sidekick from within the wreckage. He’s coated in sand, of course, and more than a little dazed, but seems no worse for wear. Quite nonchalantly, Rei begins searching through her ninja bag of tricks, finally producing what looks like a tiny bomb from within. She tosses it to the ground. It bursts into a cloud of smoke, and when the smoke has cleared what to all appearances is a black motorcycle has appeared. Rei hops on. “Come on,” she says, “let’s go home.” “Sounds like a great idea,” Zack says, hopping onto the back of the motorcycle and grabbing onto his partner’s waist. Rei starts the engine, and moments later, they’re speeding away through the desert. “Hey! Mission accomplished, right Rei?” Zack asks as he empties sand from his mask into the wind. ”Yes, Zack,” Rei replies in an uncharacteristically cheerful tone. “Against all odds, you… of all people… managed to kill the Animator of Chaos and fulfill our order’s ancient mission. Now all that’s left is to get ourselves back home.” They speed silently through the Tuzosian desert for a time, watching as the resurrected monuments of the past sink into the sands, everything colored red by the dying sun. “So, uh, after you take me back to my place, how about we do some… overtime?” Zack suggests. Rei glances backwards. “Overtime,” she repeated. “Yeah, you know,” Zack adds with a wink. “Sexually.” Rei shrugs her shoulders. “Hmm… well, you did just save the world,” she muses. “Yeah, what the hell, I guess you earned it.” Zack raises his arms in triumph. “YES! SCORE!” he cries. “You really mean it?” “No,” Rei answers. She presses a button on the cycle’s dashboard, and the back of the seat suddenly ejects from the rest of the vehicle via rocket propulsion, sending Zack spinning into the sky, hanging onto his seat for dear life. Turning the cycle around and screeching to a stop, Rei looks up to the sky, admiring her handiwork. “Look’s like Team Kocak’s blasting off again!” Zack wails as he soars towards the sky. Bup's Ending There are none left now in the diminished race of man who remember how the world was lost. Among the very old there lingers a dim recollection that something was awoken in the foul, prehistoric crypts of Tuzosia, that many men and women took up arms to repel a darkness from outside of human comprehension. But it has been many years since the last blow was struck, and the last battle lost. The only name still whispered in the scattered, decaying human outposts belongs to the champion of the great darkness: the tireless oppressor, BUP. Said to be the product of a demented mingling of the Imp and Troll bloodlines in some deep pocket of hell, the thing known as Bup is a putrid, unwieldy assortment of features comprised in a stubby, deformed monstrosity. Its weak, beady eyes are the most complex structures it possesses Futile struggles with the thing have revealed it owns no bones or organs, but instead is made of naught but thick walls of its own fetid, reddish flesh. As such, it possesses nothing like a mind, and only a mystically endowed mockery of intelligence plays out across its flattened face. It is a simple, lumbering beast, but it is a beast of extraordinary resolve. It doggedly pursues each hapless target it sights until the unlucky victim's bones have been pounded into dust, shrugging off all wounds and obstacles that impede it. And with every soul the Bup cuts down, it becomes a little stronger. Its claws grow ever sharper, its skin tougher, its perverse hungers more difficult to contain. Its demon brethren of higher rank have long since ceased their scourging of the earth, content in the utter subjugation of the human race. But this knowledge either evades Bup, or fails to quell its gruesome compulsions. It wanders the grey mounds that were once called cities, its nostrils busily searching for fresh ichor to spill. Even the sizable cults of men who have resigned themselves to serving their demon masters have not been spared in Bup's reckless warpath. Those that had been his superiors once do nothing to stop him. Perhaps they realize that when the last man dies, the now unmatched Bup will move on to new prey. The Bup cannot stop, cannot relent until even the gods have been slaughtered and the world is unmade. The last sounds that shall echo through a cold and barren universe will be a curse, long bereft of meaning, parroted by the thoughtless murderer of all: “lo'al fahagatse”. Jackacid's Ending He wore no armor, and carried no weapon, but in the end it was JACK ACID who prevailed in the AD FIGHTERS tournament. With superlative strength and keen wits to rival the heroes of legend, he dodged sprays of bullets, wrestled monsters twice his side into the dust, and matched his bare fists against fantastic powers of all different stripes. At last all of his opponents have been felled, and the mysterious mercenary stands before the innermost chamber of Hiskor, a faint light emanating from within its towering doors, where the defeated god of the place had stolen away to nurses its wounds. “You did it!” panted AGENT DR, secret government tough-guy and Acid's employer, as he raced down the remnants of a blasted sandstone staircase to survey the action he had missed out on. “That... thing, the extra-normal entity that's been causing all the commotion in Tuzosia... you found a way to stop it, didn't you?” Jack said nothing, as he was wont to do. He simply opened his palm to reveal a shard of green crystal, resting delicately in his powerful hands. It glowed, faintly. “You used the Animadversionite against it, then?” he said, his eyes transfixed on the fragment before him as he took a few steps nearer. “Of course – fighting fire with fire. Inspired. You know, I always knew you would come in handy, Acid, ever since I found you on the streets all those years ago.” A peal of laughter escaped from his throat, and he spread his arms dramatically. “And now, well... now all of the Animadversionite belongs to me! And the world will finally -” Jack made a slight movement. The crystal shard sailed through the air and thudded hard against the Regulator's skull. He collapsed, unconscious. “It was I who found you,” Jack muttered. With a powerful shove, he sent the doors to the inner sanctum flying open. The great green mass that was the ANIMATOR OF CHAOS gave off a violent shudder upon sighting the man that had defeated it. “Cease your assault!” the grotesque creature bellowed. “There are things I can offer you... pleasures and powers greater than a warrior such as yourself has ever dreamed of. Tell me, mortal... what is it you desire?” Acid peered back outside of the chamber, at the unconscious form of DR. With little effort, he gripped and closed the stone doors, and turned back to his pleading opponent. “You're wrong,” he explained, his voice echoing unnaturally. “IT IS NO MORTAL TO WHOM YOU SPEAK.” Jack Acid's body ripped itself apart and burned in the air, as though rocked by an explosion from within. A stretching new form, pulsating with a red energy all its own, unfurled itself from within. Four tendrils launched out in four directions, and a great cyclopean cross stared down at the cowering Animator. “Saimdhug!” it cried. “But how... how did you find...?” “Two billion years, thief,” the cross-thing, wreathed in red-light, spat at its foe. “For two billion years I have scanned the starlit blacks of this universe, seeking the power you stole from your elders and betters... and here I find you've spent the past few million trapped by the very organics you've been toying with?” “You shouldn't have been able to come here,” the Animator said, shrinking into the corner as plumes of red energy whipped about the room. “I should have felt your presence from lightyears away!” “Yes, I knew you would flee if you had the chance. That is precisely why I chose to incarnate myself in a newborn mortal child,” Saimdhug said. “Precisely why I led my unwitting mortal employer to learn of the crystals holding your ill-gotten power, and to set this entire war into motion. Everything has been planned, just so... that I might take my final vengeance!” … The Regulator managed to escape the scene of this final battle– only barely – as it slipped back beneath the timeless sands. The Animadversionite he had accumulated became little more than glass – a telltale sign that the source of its power had been slain. And yet, while medics tended to his injuries, he thought he saw a strange new cloud amassing above the buried ruins of Hiskor... a cloud of twisting, brilliant vermillion. This mysterious entity, disguised as Jack Acid, has slain the Animator of Chaos... but what plans does he have in store for the world he has birthed himself into? The dunes of Tuzosia tell no secrets, yet. Until the time is right, the denziens of earth can only wait for some kind of news from the new lord that lurks beneath their feet. They must wait – perhaps centuries – for an update from Saimdhug. Guenhwyvar's Ending Curtains of dust fell from the ceiling as another explosion sent tremors through the subterranean bunker. CAPTAIN AWESOME looked on, his scarred, emotionless face drowned in the red of flashing warning lights. The monotony of klaxons rang in his ears, but his eyes remained transfixed on a grid of security monitors, on the armies of men garbed in strange new uniforms that darted from screen to screen. Waves of his own soldiers, those still loyal to the WPN Spy Network, continued to hold their own against the invaders... but ultimately this new army was too great in numbers, and uncannily persistent. The Captain knew his stronghold was forfeit. GIGABANE, the Captain's loyal lieutenant, pushed through the thick steel door. His metal helmet bore the dents and scorch marks of a fire fight, and blood seeped from a graze wound on his shoulder. “Captai – no longer sa – ere,” Gigabane said, his hemet's failing audio systems crackling. “We ha – get you and Comrade Bac– the escape point.” Before the masked spy had finished speaking, the klaxons whimpered into silence, and all lights in the room went out but the grey glow of the security monitors, now left with nothing but static. “She's cut security, then,” the Captain said, rising from his chair. “I would have so liked the chance to glimpse the traitor's face, before I go...” “You may yet have – chance, sir,” Gigabane said. He tossed a large automatic weapon to his Captain, who deftly caught hold. “Quickly.” They charged out into the hallway. Screams and gunshots drew close now in the long, shadowy corridors, lit occasionally by tenuously flickering strings of lights. A low-ranking soldier ran alongside Gigabane, frantically reporting new information while a handful of others guarded their flank. “They've taken almost everything... know all our weaknesses... worse than that, they've got troops lying in wait outside the secret helipad... trying to clear them out, but they're just...” His voice was drowned out by yet another explosion, and the strangled howl of what had been a WPN agent. The Captain turned back to the darkened hallway behind them, attempting to judge how close behind his assailants were... only to witness his guards go down, one by one, in a barrage of perfectly aimed shots from some unseen marksman. Gigabane fired several rounds blindly into the hallway, shouted some garbled order that the Captain couldn't understand, and took off in the direction of the besieged helipad. The soldier that had been walking with them dropped his weapon, began loudly begging for mercy – another bullet from the dark ended his pleas. The Captain merely held his gun at his side, and waited. A platoon of enemy combatants, dressed in pale green uniforms complete with hoods and face-masks, stepped over the corpses of the Captain's men and trained their rifles upon him. At last, their leader stepped from out of the abyss. The traitor GUENHWYVAR adjusted her dark glasses, and gingerly blew on her unloaded pistol's barrel. “O Captain, my Captain,” she said with a smirk. “I wonder... could you ever, in a thousand years, have anticipated your downfall coming at the hands of a lowly assassain?” “You show far more bravery than I expected of your caste,” the Captain calmly replied. “Far less intelligence, too. I wonder if the green crystals you recovered in Tuzosia have not destroyed your mind, that you believe a reckless child such as yourself could control this organization...” “How little you know, old man,” she laughed, while absentmindedly loading a single bullet of peculiar design into her firearm. “Of the Animadversionite, of myself... of whose hands I deliver WPN into now.” “And yet, if you had planned on killing me, you would already have done so,” said the Captain. “Surely you realize that this network cannot subsist without the knowledge that I alone hold, without the allies who have sworn their loyalty only to me. Lock me away in whatever cell you like, claim the honors for what I am able to accomplish, but you and I both know that sooner or later, it will be I who -” In a split-second Guenhwyvar had pointed her gun square at her old commander's chest and fired. The bunker was lit by a bright flash as an ethereal energy consumed the Captain's body. When the light subsisted, that body no longer remained. Guenhwyvar removed her glasses, revealing blank white eyes wreathed in green flame. “Never presume to know Our designs,” she muttered in two voices. “Onward now, my servants. Much conquest yet awaits.” Rei's Ending In the pits of Hiskor, at the chamber which holds the howling gateway to hell itself, the last of a once proud and mighty order waged a final battle against their mortal foe. The ANIMATOR OF CHAOS, ancient god of hatred and creator of the Animadversionite, used all the ancient weapons at its disposal to repel the attacks of the two warriors who had been reared from birth to destroy him: ZACK and REI, the last ninjas of Kocak, defenders of the planet. The shambling colossus roared like thunder as the sapphire-haired warrior sliced arcs through its shifting, shimmering flesh with the black blade of her katana. She looked up to find a massive tentacle sweeping through the air to crush her, and kicked herself gracefully into the air to avoid it. What she failed to notice was the second tentacle creeping from behind. The Animator gripped Rei around her waist, its suckers digging into her skin. Thinking quickly, she raised her sword to hack through the offending limb, but before she had the chance a wave of demonic energy surged through the creature's skin. Incredible pain shot through Rei's core, causing her body to spasm and her katana to clatter to the ground. The Animator of Chaos made a horrible gurgling sound that somehow passed as laughter. “Give up this futile struggle and join me, o warriors of the shadow, and I shall make you the greatest agents of my sentinel army,” it boomed, “or else you will die!” Zack looked on as his mentor and friend was rocked by jolts of supernatural pain, and the fear within him transformed into rage. With a great roar, he launched himself onto another of the monster's swinging tentacles, and with uncanny speed and balance vaulted himself up the wriggling appendage and onto the Animator's head. He produced a pair of enchanted shurikens and began raking them over what appeared to be rows and rows of tiny, watery eyes. The Animator squealed, and Rei dropped to the ground. As she regained her footing, she saw a multitude of tentacles close in on Zack, twist him in their grasp, then fling his limp, motionless body into the hard walls of the chamber. Without stopping for a moment, Rei grabbed her katana and leaped upon her foe's carapace-laced back, stabbing over and over into its weak points until the hilt scraped against its loathsome skin. “NO,” it screeched. “NOT THE HOLY SWORD! IT... IT BURNS...!” And then, all at once, every part of the creature burst into tiny green globules, which hovered in the air before fading into mist. The Animator of Chaos was gone, once and for all. The doors to hell flew shut, and huge chunks of ceiling began tumbling from above. Rei ran to her partner's unconscious form, threw his arm around her shoulder, and as fast as she was able began to pull him up to the surface of the crumbling ruins. She was only barely able to make it back to the living world above, where PROPHET WING stood alone in the blinding white light. A blue bird swooped down from the desert sky to rest upon his shoulder, in what no doubt was an omen of good fortune. There were no monsters left among them, only friends... but had her friend been lost forever? Rei tossed Zack's body to the ground. She began to kneel down in order to check his vitals, but she stopped as his eyes flickered open again. “Ugh,” he weakly grumbled, “why'd you do that?” She glared down at him in disbelief. “I just saved you from the Animator!” Zack stared back at her, clearly dazed. “You did not!” he laughed. Rei rolled her eyes, her smile hidden safely behind her mask. “Well done, warriors of the bear and the lion!” the Prophet said warmly, raising his staff high. “The Animator of Chaos has been thwarted once and for all. Look!” He gestured to the strange towers and arenas that had risen from the ground at the demon-god's will, as they crumbled back to the sand from which they came. “Already, the land of Tuzosia is returning to harmony.” A tweet came from Wing's shoulder. “The birds are singing... isn't it beautiful?” he said with a chuckle. “As it is written, you, the last son and daughter of the Kocak Order, are the heroes of this world!” Zack leaped to his feet and pulled off his mask. “I guess that's worth a kiss, huh?” he remarked, slyly eying Rei before his eyes screwed themselves up into his head and he collapsed, unconscious once more. The Prophet knelt beside him to tend to his injuries. Rei, meanwhile, looked off to the horizon, where the sun lifted itself above the barren dunes to welcome a brand new day. And she whispered to herself, “I won.” Lemonyfresh's Ending It has been nearly two decades since Flight 430 went down over Brazil. Nearly two hundred passengers were either crushed or incinerated as their aircraft snapped through trees and twisted itself into a smoldering pile of scrap. The event was widely reported, and even considered a global tragedy, with families from 13 different countries mourning the loss of their loved ones. What the world did not learn was that one passenger had survived. A young girl, no older than 5, was found among the jungle brush, sadly staring after her parents' molten grave. She was, somehow, uninjured and practically unscathed. One of the men who found her spoke English, and asked her how she had survived. “God told me I could not die yet,” she answered slowly. “He said I had... something left to do.” It was noted that a mysterious, overpowering scent of lemons hung about her. Her rescuers, devout Catholics all, recognized something in the girl that was beyond the ken of normal men. She was taken before a priest, then a bishop, and then led under protest into another airplane, by which she was taken to Rome to be painstakingly observed by the highest officers of the occult in the Church hierarchy. They could all see that special quality in her right off, the shadow of some greater, miraculous presence upon her destiny. The clerics covered their tracks, and ensured that she would be dead to the world, for if she was the one whose coming was foretold then she could live her life as a daughter of none but the Lord. This girl was to be made the instrument of a forgotten office of the Church, who had mercifully been spared their duties for many centuries. She studied forgotten combat disciplines, pored over worn tomes of spiritual invocations long forbidden by papal decree. She was molded by those who raised her into what they believed she was prophesied to be: the latest in a long line of spiritual warriors, sent to serve on behalf of Christ in those secret wars waged against the armies of satan. As the years went on, the girl became more and more subsumed in her new purpose. She was emptied of all desires but that of success in her sacred calling, and soon she forgot her past, and even her own name. Her keepers referred to her only by a jocular nickname: LEMONY FRESH. It has been one year since the incident in Tuzosia, since Lemony Fresh was ordered to serve in the AD FIGHTERS tournament. She obediently and anxiously complied, confiding in her superiors how anxious she was to complete the task that God had charged her with. Tales were told of the valiant battles she fought there, of the nun who crushed all her opponents and sent demons squealing back to hell. But after the war's conclusion, and her own duel with the grand demon of Hiskor itself, she seemed to disappear altogether. Most presumed her death. After all, with her foes vanquished, what more use did the Lord have for her on this earth? One day, the Vatican is revisited by a familiar scent. A crowd of cardinals discovers their religion's secret champion huddled in a corner, cloaked in a tattered habit and clutching something small to her chest. “Lemony,” one cleric says gently, “why is it that you return to us only now?” “Couldn't come until it was born,” she rasps. “Didn't want to come here, anyway, but... I don't... I don't remember any other home... and I couldn't stay below that desert any longer...” “Born?” a cardinal echoes. “That bundle you're holding... is that...?” A nervous laugh escapes her throat. “You will see... you will all see.” She begins to unwrap the cloth from what she is carrying, and as she does the air becomes more and more sour, until the clergy found their senses burning. “I have accomplished the sacred duty that I was chosen for, all those years ago... and I owe so much to you, don't I? Yes... I shall repay you. I shall make you the first to bear witness to the true son of God.” The cloth drops to the ground, and Lemony lifts her offspring into the air. The cardinals scream. ElSyd's Ending The automotive transformer known as EL SYD has proven himself on the field of battle to be more than meets the eye – and considering that his appearance alternates between that of a futuristic car and an awesome robot, this commendation is especially potent. It was not just that he was a powerful, well-armed fighting machine, who could launch flurries of missiles and run down opponents at breakneck speeds. There was a practically unparalleled level of technical mastery he displayed in combat, due perhaps less to his enhanced robotic reflexes than to the advanced and disciplined mind Syd had possessed before he had ever fused himself to his machine. There had been trials, of course, and Syd's weapons proved less than effective against the supernatural foes he was pitted against in the AD FIGHTERS tournament. But with the aid of his trusty partner ZOIDSPILOT, and a quick upgrade that added a kick of Animadversionite to some of his arsenal, Syd managed to ride past all of his obstacles and make it to the final showdown at Hiskor Temple. The endless fights with demons and opportunists have left his partner's mech inoperable, and so it is Syd alone who stomps into the dark corners of Hiskor and faces his mighty, ethereal foe. The very sight of the thing would drive some men to madness... but for Syd, it is just another opponent. The volleys of hellish energy have singed his paint job, and the whipping green tentacles have left a sparking bunch of wires where his left arm had been, but in the end the ANIMATOR OF CHAOS is reduced to bargaining for mercy. “You are a strange being... caught between life and death,” echoes the thing's mouthless voice. “I have power over these things, you know. I can reunite your soul with flesh, if you but allow me to continue to thrive. Tell me, metal man... what is it you desire?” “Man, the only thing I want YOU to give me,” Syd shouts back, “is your FACE!” “I... I do not have an actual face,” the Animator answers after a few seconds. “Well, yeah, but it's from a movie, and... aww, forget it.” With that, Sid lifts the hood on his chest and unleashes a devastating Finisher-Beam attack, reducing the Animator of Chaos to a fine spray. The dark god's realm begins to collapse – but this is of no concern to Syd. He merely activates his jet-boots and, with sheer robot power, hurtles upwards through thick sheets of breaking ceiling and falling earth until he returns to the surface. Jonathan, his Zoid-piloting partner, stares in awe at his triumphant friend rockets from out of the ground. “Turfed,” Syd remarks with a metallic smirk. Pschniddy's Ending Zoidspilot 100's Ending Hatmoose's Ending 8-Bit-Red-Mage's Ending Panzermanathod's Ending Prophet Wing's Ending Da Regulator's Ending Raygirl's Ending Zdyne's Ending Sir Red of the Manti's Ending